


Monster

by orphan_account



Series: Voltron Shorts [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-06
Updated: 2016-08-06
Packaged: 2018-07-29 19:39:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7696813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Do you really think a monster like you could be a Voltron Paladin?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Monster

_ “Do you really think a monster like you could be a Voltron Paladin?” _

Shiro sat up abruptly in bed, covered in a cold sweat. He was having trouble sleeping again. With a sigh, he threw off his sheets and got to his feet. Right now, he just wanted some fresh air. Not that it was easy to come by on a giant castle-ship flying through space, but a walk was going to have to do. It was late at night and the castle was silent. His footsteps echoed as he walked through the halls, and the only other sounds he heard were the occasional soft hums of machinery working to keep the castle going. 

It wasn’t long before he found himself in the bridge. It was, by far, his favourite place to go on his late night wanderings. Just something about seeing the expanse of the universe around him through the giant windows was comforting. It reminded him how small his problems were in the grand scheme of things, and more importantly it reminded him about what he was here for. What he was doing. Also, the bridge was so serene at this time of night, making it a great place to just sit and think. And so Shiro sunk down to the floor, his back resting against a navigation console.

_ He was just trying to psych you out _ . He told himself.  _ You learned about this way back in the Garrison. Psychological warfare. That’s all this is _ . Shiro buried his face in his hands. He  _ knew _ that this was just another one of Sendak’s cruel tactics, but it wouldn’t have hit him so hard if it he hadn’t been echoing the thoughts that already spent so much time stuck in his head. Shiro was not normal. He knew that. And when he had been growing up, that had always been a good thing. Always getting above average grades, excelling at anything that he could put his mind to. When he was little, he’d always been proud of his not-normalness. 

But an indefinite amount of time on a Galra prison ship had changed him. Now he wasn’t just the freakishly talented young astronaut that every Galaxy Garrison student wanted to become, he was the freak with the weird magical robot arm and the fucked up head. His hair had already started turning white when he was barely in his mid-twenties, and then there was the dull ache in what was left of his human arm. He leaned back against the cool metal console and let out a sigh. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that he wasn’t the same as he was before. He was different now. As much as he wished it wasn’t so, part of him was made of Galra technology.

_ “Do you really think a monster like you could be a Voltron Paladin?” _ He could still feel Sendak’s eyes on him, and his voice was stuck so far in his head that he wasn’t sure that it would ever come out. He heard it in his dreams, he heard it when he was training, he heard it when he was eating.  _ Monster, monster, monster. _ As much as he tried, he couldn’t forget about that word. He looked down at his metal arm, gently opening and closing his fist. He couldn’t even remember how it had happened. All he could remember was waking up one day in a cramped Galra prison with a metal arm and incredible pain running through his shoulder. Over time, the pain in his arm had subsided from agonizing to a dull ache every now and again, enough to remind him of how different he was from everyone else.

_ Monster. _

Part of him believed that it was true, there was no doubt about that. He had no clue how his arm worked or what else the Galra had done to him. The way he’d been treated when he’d first come back down to Earth, it was like they didn’t even see him as a person any more. They took one look at his robot arm of destruction and treated him like he was some kind of alien test subject. 

Like he was a monster. 

Sometimes at night when he went to sleep he was still tied down to that cold operating table, with people in surgical masks leaning over him muttering to each other. 

_ “Take it off. We don’t know what he can do with it yet,” One masked scientist said to the team.  _ Shiro struggled against the straps holding him down in vain, bright lights from above shining blindingly into his eyes. 

_ “What about anesthetic?” _

_ “It’s fine. He’s tied down anyways. It’s not like he’s going to do us any harm, not like this.” _

And then he would hear the soft whir of an electric surgical saw before he woke up sweating and panting. Nightmares came more often now. Sometimes he was on back on that dreaded Galra ship, and other times he was back on Earth. He didn’t know what was worse; the dreams where he was being tortured again, or the dreams when he saw his father’s face filled with shock and horror at what he had become. Often he’d find himself staying up for most of the night, unable to sleep. And he’d tried everything he could to make sure that nobody else needed to worry about him. While his team members made jokes about his habit of wearing eyeliner, it made him feel comfortable knowing that wearing makeup hid how puffy his eyes were, and how big and dark the bags underneath them could get. And he was pretty sure that nobody had figured it out. Except maybe Keith.

_ Keith. _

Shiro sighed. To say that Keith and him had gotten closer since they had left Earth would be an understatement. Keith had asked Shiro about being more than friends on at least four separate occasions, and each time Shiro had let him down. He’d tried to brush them off by telling him that his main priority was fighting the Galra right now, or that maybe Keith would be more suited to one of the other paladins. But he was certain that by now Keith had a better idea of the real reason. The bottomline was that Shiro knew he had a lot of emotional baggage, and the last thing he wanted to do was heft it all onto another person. Keith, it seemed, had a substantial amount of his own shit to deal with, and he really didn’t want to add to that load. And besides, Keith deserved better than someone who he’d have to comfort after nightmares every night.

Keith deserved better than a monster. 

Although the bridge was a great place to think, it was also a great place for things he didn’t want to think about to come and find him. Thinking about Keith had got him thinking about other things. And while he was sure that if one day they got back to Earth, all the other paladins would fit in just fine, going back to their families (or in Keith’s case, in the middle of the desert), but his last short experience on Earth had made it quite clear that he didn’t really fit in since recent developments. What the hell was he going to do if he even survived all this? Go back and explain to his parents how while he was taken hostage by evil aliens bent on intergalactic domination they cut off his arm and replaced it with a deadly weapon?

One time, during a particularly bad nightmare, he’d activated his arm in sleep. Thankfully, only Shiro’s bedding sustained injuries (which he replaced quickly without anyone’s knowledge), but the idea of how much harm he could do even while he was in his sleep scared him. If he hadn’t been alone, God knows what could have happened.

He wondered how long this would last. How many sleepless nights and stolen pain medications he would have to go through before it would be over. And would he even be the same when it was over? Or would all this pain eventually leave him numb inside. Tears welled up in his eyes and Shiro let them. It was okay. Here there was nobody to see them. There was nobody he had to be strong for. He could be scared, angry, hurt; all of the feelings he couldn’t let anyone else see.

He jumped when he heard the smooth hiss of the bridge door open. Stood at the doorway, still dressed in his sleepwear, was Keith. Fuck. He really didn’t need this right now.

“Shiro?” Keith asked, concerned. “Are you crying?” Shiro hurried to wipe his eyes as Keith made his way over to the console.

“No. I’m fine Keith, I just -- “ He attempted a weak smile.

“Shiro, I heard you.” Keith replied. “And besides, your eyeliner’s all smudged.”

“Damn stuff was supposed to be waterproof.” Shiro tried to laugh.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s fine, Keith.”

“It’s the middle of the night and you’re on the floor alone crying, Shiro. I’m pretty sure that’s the complete opposite of being  _ fine. _ ” Keith stated. Shiro made no response, wiping away leftover tears.

“Can I sit with you?” Keith asked. Shiro looked up at him, his eyes wide with concern and worry. 

“Fine.” Shiro said. And Keith sat down beside him. For a while, neither paladin spoke. Although Shiro didn’t dare to look, he could feel Keith’s eyes on him. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Keith asked after a few long seconds of silence. When Shiro hesitated, Keith put a reassuring hand on Shiro’s shoulder. “It might help.”

“Really, Keith. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“Shiro, please, you can’t pretend that everything’s fine when you’re like this.” Keith replied. “I know you’ve been nightmares and not sleeping or anything.”

“What?”

“You know, you spend so much time and put so much effort into taking care of each of us. We’re worried about you, you know. We all are. And I know that you can’t sleep at night, and I know that you come here to think when that happens. I don’t know. Maybe I’m not the best person to be talking to about all this, but maybe you should talk to someone at least.”

“Really, you’re worrying too much.” Shiro said. “It’s just that, well a lot of stuff happened when I was on that Galra ship, and sometimes it just comes back to me when I don’t want it to.”

“Shiro.” Keith began. “Why didn’t you  _ tell  _ anyone that you were having flashbacks and nightmares and all this shit? We could have done something to help you.”

“I know, it’s just a lot to deal with.”

“Then you shouldn’t have to deal with it alone.” Keith replied.”Please, tell me what’s going on.” And so, after some consideration, Shiro began to talk. He started with the little stuff, the things that weren’t as bad. He didn’t know how Keith would react to hearing about the worse things that came from Shiro’s mind and he wasn’t going to push to find out. And besides, it actually didn’t feel as bad as he thought it would. While he talked Keith gently rubbed his back, smiling softly at him every now and again.”

“It’s just a lot to think about, everything that happened on the ship. Some of that stuff, the prison, the battle area, damn Sendak. I can’t get his damn voice out of my head.”

“And what is he saying?” Keith asked. Shiro hesitated.

“Shiro, what is he saying?” Shiro swallowed and looked away.

_ “Do you really think a monster like you could become a Voltron Paladin?” _ Shiro whispered the words, he felt Keith’s grip on him tighten.

“Shiro…I... I -- “ Keith stuttered, lost for words. 

“It’s okay Keith, thanks for the talk.” He moved to get up before he could see what would no doubt be a face filled with hurt and concern. But before he could, he Keith pulled him back down. Shiro turned to face him, Keith’s purple eyes locked on his own.

“Sendak’s wrong.” Keith said firmly. “You’re not a monster.”

“Keith, I have an alien weapon permanently attached to my body. They did this to me to make me into some kind of weapon for them. Whatever I am, I’m not normal.”

“Well, none of us are either.” Keith replied. “And besides,we need you. We can’t form Voltron without you, you know.” 

“Thanks.” Shiro managed a weak smile. 

“You know, we all care about you a lot.  _ I _ care about you a lot.”

“Look, Keith, you deserve -- “ Shiro began before he was cut off.

“I don’t care about deserving anything, Shiro. I like  _ you. _ I like you and your robot arm and your white hair and your eyeliner. Nothing’s going to change that.”

“It’s not going to be easy dealing with me.” Shiro replied.

“I don’t care about easy, Shiro. I want to be there for you. I want to help you. You make me feel like no other person has, just being around you makes me happier. Let me make you happier now.” Keith placed his hands over Shiro’s, one on his flesh and one on his prosthetic. He hesitated, looking at Shiro hopefully until the black paladin took his Keith’s hands in his own, holding them gently.

“It’s going to take time you know.” Shiro said.

“I know. And I guess we’ll have plenty of it while we’re out protecting the universe, right?” Keith smiled warmly, and Shiro couldn’t help but smile back. Keith stood and helped Shiro to his feet. “Come on, come with me and rest now. You must be pretty tired.”

Shiro hummed and let Keith him lead him out of the bridge and back to his room. He fell asleep with hushed whispers in his ear.

“You’re not a monster.”

**Author's Note:**

> Check out my tumblr at long-days-pleasant-nights if you'd like to give me suggestions, critique or just talk about space gays


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